About us

About us

The Faculty of Occupational Medicine is a charity committed to improving health at work. It is the professional and educational body for occupational medicine in the UK and seeks to ensure the highest standards in the practice of occupational medicine.

Our Vision

Healthy working lives for all.

Our Position

The Faculty of Occupational Medicine believes everyone of working age has the right to benefit from healthy and rewarding work while not putting themselves or others at unreasonable risk. They have the right to access competent occupational medical advice as part of comprehensive occupational health and safety services, ensuring that they can access the rewards of good employment and avoid preventable injury and illness caused or aggravated by work.

Our Mission

To drive improvement in the health of the working age population through outstanding occupational health capability by developing and supporting the good practice of occupational medicine. To provide public benefit through the protection of people at work by ensuring the highest professional standards of competence, quality and ethical integrity.

Our Values

Collaborative, Authoritative, Relevant, Ethical.

We work in partnership with other occupational health bodies to promote health and work in many ways. Our aim is for healthy working lives through:

maximising people’s opportunities to benefit from healthy and rewarding work while not putting themselves or others at unreasonable risk

elimination of preventable injury and illness caused or aggravated by work

access for everyone to advice from a competent occupational physician as part of comprehensive occupational health and safety services

providing support to the Faculty’s membership to raise the standard of occupational health practice.

The organisation was established in 1978 as a faculty of the Royal College of Physicians but is now an independently constituted body with its own governance, membership and finances.

Our primary functions are:

setting standards for occupational medicine

managing specialty training in occupational medicine

providing educational conferences and training for those working in occupational health and medicine

offering qualifications in occupational medicine and related areas

setting standards for, and accrediting, occupational health services

supporting audit and the promotion of guidelines and evaluation of clinical effectiveness

developing a revalidation process for occupational medicine

seeking to influence policy makers, with a view to improving health at work

providing access to information on health and work for people in the workplace.

The Faculty does not:

register or license occupational physicians; this is the role of the General Medical Council (GMC)

deal with complaints about individual doctors; this is the role of the doctor’s employer or the General Medical Council.